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On November 17th, AT&T announced their acquisition of SLO Cellular based out of San Luis Obispo County on California's Central Coast.

AT&T* today announced that Cellular One customers in San Luis Obispo County, Calif. are now AT&T customers. The transition follows AT&T’s acquisition of SLO Cellular, which had operated under the Cellular One brand.

Once network transition and integration work is completed, subscribers in this service area will enjoy the benefits of the nation’s fastest mobile broadband network. AT&T expects to roll out its mobile broadband service to all of the acquired properties, which includes 46 cell sites, over the coming year.

“Mobile broadband is changing how we live our lives and transforming every sector of business, and AT&T is leading the way,” said Andy Shibley, vice president and general manager, AT&T’s Greater Los Angeles Area. “We’re excited that with this acquisition, AT&T will bring the benefits of mobile broadband to new subscribers. We mobilize everything for our customers by delivering the fastest mobile broadband experience nationwide, the most popular smartphones, an array of emerging devices like eReaders and netbooks, the ability to talk and browse the Web at the same time and access to more than 225,000 apps.”**

Apple has now made the iOS 4.2 update available to its iOS devices. The update brings multi-tasking and folders to iPad, along with a slew of new features and improvements across the iOS device line. Features and info can be found here.

Would you switch carriers if your current one replaced unlimited data plans with solely UBP (usage-based plans)?

According to a survey conducted by Sanford C. Bernstein and Co. 58% of light data users and 67% of heavy data users would do just that.

Mobile subscribers in the United States prefer unlimited data plans, according to a newly released survey conducted by analyst firm Sanford C. Bernstein and Co. The survey, which was conducted in July, comes as a number of Tier 1 wireless carriers unveil usage-based mobile data plans.

According to the survey, 58 percent of light data users said they would change carriers to get an unlimited data plan. Among the highest data users, that figure rose to 67 percent. "Customers generally have strongly negative perceptions about UBP, and these are often not correlated with self-interest," Bernstein analyst Craig Moffet said in a research note, referring to usage-based pricing.

I'm giving away a Powermat induction charging system for the iPhone 3G/3Gs. It comes with an iPhone charging sleeve and a charging surface.

To enter this contest just reply to this thread. I'll be picking a random poster from this thread in a week.

Please only one entry per person, this contest is not open to HowardForum moderators.

NOTE: This contest has been running in the Apple forum since the 12th. Just wanted to let everyone know that it's ending tomorrow night, so if you haven't submitted an entry please do so before then for your chance to win.

Beginning November 18th and lasting until January 7th, Verizon Wireless customers on a Nationwide Family SharePlan of $69.99 or more who add an additional line with a smartphone and data plan of $29.99 will have the $9.99 monthly access fee credited for 24 months.

Verizon is considering an alternative route for LTE pricing. Similar to how home broadband works, they might be charging based on the speed you want. For example, 5 megs a sec is cheaper than 12 megs a sec. I think this route will prove both efficient and flexible for people like me who probably won't ever need more than 5 megs a sec.

"If you want to pay for less speed, you'll pay for less speed and consume more, or you can pay for high speed and consume less," Verizon Chief Financial Officer Fran Shammo said Wednesday.

At this week's Web 2.0 Summit RIM co-CEO Jim Balsillie had some words for Apple about apps vs. the web:

"...the Web shouldn't be an app. I don't need a YouTube app to go to YouTube.

"We believe that you can bring the mobile to the Web," he said, according to Telegraph. "You don't need to go through some kind of software development kit. That's the core part of our message. You can use your existing development environment. There's still a role for apps, but can you use your existing content? Can you use your existing Web assets? Do you need a set of proprietary tools to bring existing assets on to a device, or can you use known tools that you use for creating websites?"

Is this simply a case of sour grapes (<20,000 apps vs. ~250,000) or is he on to something?

Are you planning to treat yourself to a new smartphone this season? Or buy one to give as a gift?

With several smartphone operating systems and form factors out there, you have a lot to choose from.

With that in mind FierceWireless has put together a nice guide to what they believe are the top smartphone and tablet devices (webOS devices are not listed unfortunately) amongst the U.S.'s Tier 1 carriers (Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile). Visit the link above for the list.

So I was at the Eaton Center today (in Toronto) and figured I'd go to the TELUS, Rogers and Bell stores and ask the people there if people where buying Windows Phone 7 devices and just check out how high a profile the devices have in the stores.

First off I went to the TELUS store near the south side. There is an HTC Surround right in the middle of the entrance of the store. They were giving away 100 XBox 360's with WP7 purchase on Monday. Seems they sold around 50 or so WP7's on launch (and then MS came and took the rest of the XBox 360's away). The WP7's seem to be moving okay. They have plenty of stock of HTC Surrounds while they never had stock of the LG Optimus 7's.

Next I went to Bell. There is live LG Optimus Quantum that you can play with but it's off to the side and it was turned off. Actually both Bell stores were like this. They didn't seem to be pushing WP7 as much. One of the people there said they were selling okay. Some people were coming in wanting to buy them while others were steered towards them.

Next up was Rogers Plus. The first one (next to the south TELUS store) had a big lineup so I didn't want to wait. I looked around quickly and didn't see any mention of WP7. The Kiosk near the middle of the mall had someone I could talk to. The person told me that you can only get a WP7 device online at rogers.com and that retail wouldn't be getting anything until the end of the month.

I was about to leave when I decided to swing by Future Shop. I didn't see any WP7 displays or dummy devices. I also took a look at their stock (it was behind glass) and didn't see any WP7 phones. I'll grill some people next time I'm there.

Overall I was a little suprised Windows Phone 7 didn't have a higher profile. Part of this may be a lack of hardware - Rogers didn't have any Samsung Focus and there were no LG Optimus 7's available at TELUS. Another thing I noticed is that at least in Canada Microsoft is more interested in promoting the Kinect. There was a big bill board at Dundas Square plus they had a store across from the Eaton Center where you could try it.

Skyfire for iPhone's app has been downloaded 300,000+ times over the course of a weekend. Its main claim to fame on iOS is Flash to HTML5 video conversion on the fly, allowing its users to view a piece of the web that can't be viewed on the native Safari browser.

The large sales amount in such a short amount of time raises an interesting discussion; is this perhaps a sign that might prod Apple to eventually support Flash natively on iOS, or will they wait for HTML5 adoption to catch up?

IntoMobile reports on a survey conducted by the New Millennium Research Council (NMRC) to gauge consumer desire to switch to prepay mobile services.

Of the 1,000 surveyed, 1 in 5 currently using contract service are planning or desiring to switch to prepaid in the next six months. Over half of those surveyed said they would switch to prepay if not for the early termination fee imposed by their carrier.

Google announced today via their Mobile Blog that they have made a beta version of Google Instant available for most iOS and Android devices.

In September we announced that we were working to bring Google Instant to mobile, and today we’re making a beta version available to most iPhone and Android devices in the U.S. To try it out, go to google.com in your phone’s browser and tap the Google Instant “Turn on” link beneath the search box (if you don’t see the “Turn on” link, try waiting a moment and then refresh the page).

To celebrate Diwali, Mobilicity is providing all new and existing customers FREE calling to India from November 4th until November 7th, 2010, 11:59 p.m. Call your friends and family and wish them happy Diwali! Additionally, Mobilicity is offering popular Bollywood and mainstream ringtones for 99 cents! Even if you don’t celebrate Diwali, it’s a great time to customize your phone with a great ringtone. But hurry, this special Diwali rate on select ringtones ends on November 17th. Review and download the discounted ringtones by launching your browser on your phone’s menu.

LOL. I'm glad you're here in this thread (that I started). You're certainly welcome here, but you don't have to be here. It's a free forum. It's an interesting topic and I feel it's worthy of review...